Puppet TV Graffiti created by Nottingham based Contemporary Artist, Marcus Clarke.

Contemporary Artist and Flippant Dadaist Marcus Clarke's Contact
'Puppet TV Graffiti' page. (Marcus has Canadian permanent residence status.)
“Affectionate anarchy". Divergent Art.

New Puppetised works underway returning to themes of childhood, buildings and the built environment for a major new exhibition available 2014.

Puppetised Surface Gallery Nottingham

I'm interested in what's real,ritual,funny and loss. I don't know why?
Advancing Puppetry and Contemporary Art by imbuing objects and images, with some of the qualities of a puppet. Primarily the ability to convey irreverence and the illusion of life. I'm 'Puppetizing' things.

Materials. I use Drawings, Photographic images on card or canvas. Real objects and clothing as a base and then add to them using my Puppet Making materials and techniques. Puppet props and Costumes. Bits and bobs.

Marcus Clarke Self Portrait 4. (right) Pencil, Graphite Pen, Charcoal on Paper with Shirt, Foam, Faux Fur and sculpted and cast styrene Eyeball. Button, hairgrips, feathers and Shoelace on Foam Board.

Influences. As well as Puppetry and History, irreverence and the illusion of life. I am also interested in so called Secret Societies, hidden knowledge, Freemasonry and Symbolism. Labels.

Canadian Project Ancient to Modern. In a childs footsteps. Details

Below. Some British Art Show Venues for 2010 and some People are Puppetised.

Nottingham Castle Gallery and Museum Titled 'Yes we have no Bananas'	Title. Nottingham Contemporary Art Gallery	New Art Exchange Titled 'Hey Mr. Tallyman'

Titled David Cod Cameron	Title. Tracy Ermin Emin	Title. Ed Miliband.

About this work. Bow Street Buttons.
At the top of the now closed down Bow Street Magistrates Court there is written a date, 1879. At that time my Grt. Grt. Grt. Grandfather and three generations of his family were living close by. Working as Greengrocers on the Markets, including Covent Garden. He himself became a Weights Tester for the LCC in 1897. They would all have known this Building well though I never knew any of them. So I filled the boarded up door with Pearl and Gold Buttons. Pearls being a Cockney emblem for deal making and Gold for the profit in it.

About this work. Reliquario di Pinocchio

A fragment of the true nose of Pinocchio in it's original Reliquary. More

Below. 'First Thursday Night and Saturday Morning'

Some Quotes.
"interesting juxtaposition, an eclectic mishmash, a concentration of tropes". "Gesamtkunstwerk". anon
"A local artist – making a mark regionally, nationally and internationally". Peter Knott. ACE.
"A play with Semiotics". "If I didn't think I was creating great Art, I wouldn't do it". "Chaos out of order" and
"I've never worried about being 'found out'. I know I'm not a fraud." Marcus Clarke
"Who does he think he is". The Spectacle

Artistic Statement.

I'm an artist and an artiste. My contemporary Artwork has developed considerably since I first returned to it in 2010. Having enjoyed a successful 20+ year Puppetry and Performing Arts sabbatical and I'm currently exploring and incorporating a few new Semiotic ideas into my 'Puppetising'. (Spelt with an s or a z) Including Victor Shklovsky's assertion that; Art's key function is estrangement, defamiliarization or 'making strange'. What many Semioticians call denatuturalization.
This is something that can potentially show ideology at work. That 'reality' can be challenged.

Press

The front Cover of June/July 2011 Nottingham Culture Magazine 'LeftLion' Created by Marcus Clarke.

Inside is an interview with Marcus Clarke. Interview
LeftLion Shoot Video
Previous LeftLion Article. Previous
InTouch Magazine interview
BBC Articles and Radio Interviews. BBC

Childhood Short Stories page

Exhibitions and Hangings.

Surface Gallery International Postcard Show 2013

January 16th to February 2nd 2013

FAB Fringe Arts Bath 2012. Mis-in-Formation.
Three Works including 'Aproval needed'.

Nottingham Castle Gallery Annual Open 2011 Marcus Clarke exhibiting 'Or it's just a Brick.' Viewers of this Film may also find this clip from Fellini's ROMA of interest. Comment: There's a lot of comedy and dramatic creativity that you added to that event that wasn't already there or would have been humourless and self regarding. You made your own self and the refused piece into the art!
Surface Gallery Nottingham 2011 'Salon des Refuse's' August 2011 Works hung titled Nottingham on the Square Native Marcus Clarke (Self Portrait)

About this work. self Portrait.
'Native Marcus Clarke'.

Many Artists have done a Self Portrait and I wanted to do one too. Recently I got out all of my Puppetised Pictures to show a Magazine Editor. I saw the opportunity to grab a photo of myself with my Pictures. Helena (below) obliged. More

Title
Nottingham City Council House on the Square

Review.
Marcus works at the deconstructive interface of iconic imagery and innovative artistic practice. He playfully détourns or high jacks or subverts iconic images to give them a different meaning. His work plays with the pieces of given aesthetic images and adds and subtracts visual cues to provide a different horizon of possibilities in the image.
In this way his work moves from the image to the gesture. Following Giorgio Agembem's work on the use of Cinema as creating space to take images to a gestural politics. For example, his representation of the iconic image of Nottingham Council House has been détourned to change the meaning to a playful and humorous deconstructive reading of the role and function of civic buildings generally and Nottingham's identity specifically.
His contemporary development shows a significant movement from artistic animation and creation, to an aesthetic of flippant-dadaism, a powerful yet playful project of creative destruction to produce auratic art.
Marcus makes a telling and significant contribution to contemporary aesthetic production and consumption, and makes a significant impact, amongst a variety of stakeholders, with his auratic art. Dr. Adam Barnard.

As a Visual Artist and Curator I have delved into the work of Marcus Clarke for his interesting perspectives on his works politically, geographically and for his alternative observations. His work is playful but also omits a familiar reasoning. As a fellow resident in Nottingham, it is interesting to see Marcus being involved and speaking for the mass in terms of 'defamiliarization' where one has to disown their prior knowledge to return to it and embrace anew. It is this connection where I engage in his creative development as an evolving artist whose work encompasses the social state with a humorous and nonconforming approach. His energy and pro-activeness consistently offers an unpredictable view of his work. Diana Ali. http://www.dianaali.com/

4 Puppetised Jacket's Project page